Eight and a Half Minutes
by GuiltyRed
Summary: Sephiroth: Claiming - He owns so little, but this belongs to him.


July 17

**Title:** Eight and a Half Minutes  
**Author/Artist:** GuiltyRed  
**Rating:** PG  
**Warnings:** spoilers for ending of "Advent Children"  
**Word count:** 707  
**Summary:** Claiming what is his.  
**Prompt:** Sephiroth: Claiming - He owns so little, but this belongs to him.  
**A/N: **The title refers to the amount of time between Cloud cutting open the box and Kadaj joining the Lifestream. So much happened in such a short span…and Kadaj watched it all.

Kadaj smiles grimly as he clutches the contents of the ruined box to his chest. A profound serenity fills him: he has found Mother, and Reunion is upon him at last. No more waiting. No more searching.

Only this.

He takes a breath and focuses all his awareness on the task at hand. The writhing energy in his grasp must surely behave like materia, needing only to be assimilated into himself to realize its potential. Concentrating as never before, he shuts his eyes and _pulls_.

The air leaves his chest in a short grunt; it _hurts_, a cold burn unlike any materia he's ever known, but there is no turning back. Deep within, something stirs and begins to wake, uncoiling into his awareness with a slow, easy stretch. Kadaj gasps as the alien essence fills him, flowing through his body as he continues to fall.

By the time his feet touch down on something solid, the pain has given way to a sensation of pressure, not from outside but within. In the next heartbeat the pressure is gone, leaving behind a thrumming tautness to every cell. He feels as though he's been flying, not falling, and he reels as his nerves send conflicting data to his brain. His skin prickles with a thousand sharp kisses, electric and quick. Face flushed and eyes half-shut, Kadaj gives himself over willingly, arching into the intangible caress as though offering himself to his brother.

The presence that has waited so patiently for this surrender purrs within his mind. "Good boy, Kadaj…"

Kadaj watches as his own hands raise up, higher than they should be able, and meet the coming attack with bright steel.

He feels his mouth open, but the voice that comes forth is not his own: "Good to see you, Cloud."

Words spill from him, promises of retribution and devastation, and Kadaj wonders for a moment if he has gone mad. Then comprehension sinks in: Kadaj's body isn't his own anymore.

Deep inside, the Other whispers: "Oh, but it never _was_."

Intent and action become one as battle is engaged in earnest. As though granting a boon, the Other lets him feel everything: the rush of air as he charges and leaps, almost flying; the heft of a blade far greater than lost Souba; the thrill of mako like lightning in his veins.

The power is intoxicating. Pain and fear pale beside the potency of his Reunion, so beyond anything he'd imagined! Kadaj bears silent witness to his altered form, rejoicing in the effortless motion and godlike speed, sheer beauty with no other purpose than destruction. He has become the Angel, Her favored Son, and he would carry Her will forward until the end of time!

A whisper of dark laughter against a sudden silence calls his attention outward.

Something's wrong.

In a blur of gold, the enemy strikes, again and again and again; Kadaj loses count after the third strike. The swords hit with impossible force, carving flesh from spirit so fast Kadaj can't even scream.

Dimly he feels a new pressure as a single black wing sprouts from his shoulder. Prophetic words drop from his lips in a voice like Death as the power within begins to unravel.

The laughter comes again, from a distance this time. "_You_ had become _me_? No, little one. You had become _mine_, and now I discard you as easily as any other puppet."

Kadaj falls in a rain of black feathers. Fresh pain envelopes him as he hits the ground, his mind and body torn beyond repair – but even this cannot compare to the choking sense of loss at the sudden _silence_. The whisper that was Mother, the command that was her Son: all gone.

He staggers forward, determined to finish his battle, but his body cannot obey him any longer. He collapses, pitching forward into the arms of his enemy.

His _brother_.

Those arms cradle him tenderly, as a brother should. Mako-bright eyes hold only sorrow; he, too, knows that Kadaj is broken.

The sky begins to weep, a holy rain that promises a good mother's love.

High above those clouds, the wind turns, and a throaty purr rumbles like far-off thunder: "Pity. But I can always make another one."


End file.
